Who We Leave Behind
by Jedi Skysinger
Summary: Series of One Shots exploring those left behind in the BN Universe. POV's vary, but always connected to Michael Westen, from his leaving home at 17 to right before the Ireland assignment. Companion series on the M-page will cover similar events in the After Ireland timeframe. Chapters are named for the time and place in which they occur.
1. Miami November 1984

**_A/N: This series chronicles those who are left behind the in the BN universe and will cover events up to Asset Management. There is a companion story on the M page which will chronicle the similar events after said tale. The story of Michael leaving Samantha should be up in the next day or so on that page._**

**_Much love and thanks as always to Amanda Hawthorne, Purdy's Pal and Daisy Day for reading through and keeping me sane these last few months. Love to all the Burner Girls on FB and Twitter and many thanks to everyone who kept reading and reviewing while I was off the boards all these months._**

()()()

**Miami, November 1984**

The first thing that caught her attention was the front door being closed quietly. Someone was sneaking in or out. No one in her household was considerate enough to not slam the door when they weren't trying to be stealthy. Then there was a thunderous crash in the living room.

_Now what?_

She continued hanging up the shirts she was pulling from the dryer. Frank was very particular about his shirts and, although he insisted she use a laundry line to save power, nothing like a dryer tumble would get them the way he liked them without having to take the time to iron them. She detested ironing.

Besides, there had been too much broken glass, broken furniture and broken bones in her household for Madeline Westen to get terribly excited about the sound of a body hitting the floor or table being knocked over. She could hear the sounds of pills tumbling inside their respective plastic bottles and, since there was no cursing or further noise in the wake of the medicine table being up-ended, she assumed she was safe to continue on.

_What was Nate up to now?_

Ever since his older brother had advised her youngest son that he was going to have to get some actual training before he could even dream to taking him on, Nate had thrown himself into martial arts classes and thrown himself on the floor—a lot.

She sighed. Her baby boy tried hard, but he just didn't have Michael's coordination and no amount of training was going to make up for the six year age difference between her boys. Nate at eleven was never going to be a match for his brother at seventeen.

"Nice try, kid."

_Michael!_

She abandoned her task and rushed toward the front of the house. Her oldest child had been gone for over a week. It was the longest he had ever disappeared with some kind of word. As she came into the room, she saw Michael was wearing new clothes as he stood over his kid brother, who was lying on his back next to the over turned TV tray which he'd presumably encountered on his way to the floor.

Maddie took a brief moment to wonder from what store he'd shoplifted his new attire. Even his casual wardrobe had been upgraded over the last two years. She'd seen quite a few labels show up in the laundry that hadn't come from K-mart and the jobs she knew he had didn't cover the cost of such.

"Look who I caught trying to sneak in," Nate announced proudly, even though he was flat on his back.

"Get those bottles picked up," she ordered and then turned her gaze onto firstborn's face as he finally met her eyes. What she saw left her rooted to the spot.

Michael had two faded black eyes, a bump still evident on the bridge of his nose and a deep cut on his chin that had obviously needed stitches it hadn't gotten.

"What happened?" she gasped. "Were you in a fight?"

"Sort of," he shrugged. "More like the Charger was."

Her eyes flicked quickly to the dining room windows which looked out onto the driveway between the house and garage. There sat her husband's car, looking black and pristine in the mid-morning sun.

Her eldest had taken it, so he had said, to go a trip to Orlando for the weekend. Since Frank was also supposed to be away on the business trip for the whole week, she'd agreed. She hadn't really wanted her son go to all the way to Orlando in what would probably be a stolen car. What Michael hadn't told her was he didn't want to run the risk of using a stolen car either because of contraband he'd be carrying. Being relatively new to the gun running trade, he hadn't wanted to take any _more _chances.

Madeline looked back him, worry beginning to mix with disapproval. "You were supposed to be back on Monday! I was worried sick, I was calling all the hospitals. What if your father had come home while—"

From his position on the carpet, gathering the wayward bottles and placing them back on the small wooden tray table, the youngest Westen made a cutting motion under his throat "kkkeeeekkk!"

"Nate!" she reprimanded before surging forward to gather Michael's face between her palms. "Honey, tell me what happened," she demanded.

Michael rolled his head to the side and out of her grasp, taking a step back. "I was on my way back when I got rear-ended. I was stuck in traffic with nowhere to go, so I ate the steering wheel."

Madeline looked in open confusion from the battered face of her son to the obviously undamaged trunk of her husband's latest pride and joy. Since none of them ever used the seat belts in the car, that wasn't even worth mentioning.

"I had it fixed," he retorted as if that should have been obvious.

"In Orlando?"

"What was I gonna do? Bring it all the way back _here_ on a hook? What d'ya think took so long? "

"Who do you know in Orlando that fixes-?" His mother queried, but as soon as she said it, Maddie knew the answer. "Michael, your father told you not to have anything to do with that kid from Lauderdale."

"Kid?" he snorted in response. "He's 23!"

"Oh, and that makes him a man," she huffed. "He's bad news, Michael. He got run out of town, for gods sakes. You're lucky you only got in a car accident instead someone shooting the windows out of your father's car!"

"Yea, well, at least I got finished before—" Michael suddenly swallowed whatever he was going to say and turned towards Nate, who had completed his task and was obviously getting ready for round two of the wrestling match. "C'mon, kid, let's see if you can spot any defects in the paint job."

The eldest Westen boy pushed the younger in front of him and past their mother. "Hey, Ma, could you make me a sandwich?" he asked back over his shoulder as he directed Nate towards the back door." I haven't eaten since yesterday."

Madeline knew it was a ploy, but she also knew he had her. When had she ever refused to feed him as hard as it was to get him to eat? Grumbling under her breath, she pulled out a cigarette out of the pack on the kitchen counter, lit it and then moved towards the refrigerator.

-000-

Michael had actually wolfed down two sandwiches and polished off a bag of chips, though truthfully Nate had eaten the majority of the bag. Their mother stood in the living room, smiling indulgently at the sleeping figure on the couch while glaring at his younger sibling. She didn't need anything more than the expression on Nate's face to know he was planning on doing something to his older brother while his guard was down.

"Leave him alone, Nate. Your brother's exhausted."

"There's nothing on," he complained, looking between Michael's slack profile and the television.

"Why don't you go wash your father's car and get all the bugs off? That will make Daddy happy when he gets home."

"Okay…" he conceded after a moment. It would easier to cool off with the hose than gamble how hot the old man might be when he got home. Much better, Nate decided, to be out of the line of fire and in his father's good graces whenever Frank Westen returned home from his road trip.

She didn't need anything other than the fact that her son was sleeping in a vulnerable position to tell her how worn out he was, sitting with his head thrown back onto the top of couch, his mouth almost hanging open . His mother watched him for moment longer before begrudgingly getting out the ironing board. She loved her sons with all her heart, but there were some days where it just seemed like nothing would ever work for either of them.

Michael's arrival meant she had missed her opportunity to pull the warmed shirts out of the dryer and now they had to be ironed. Madeline was fuming internally as she reached under the cabinet below the sink and went to fill the appliance from the bottle of distilled water she'd retrieved from there. Mrs. Westen would never make the mistake of using an iron containing municipal tap water on another one of her husband's shirts ever again. Her left ear still rang sometimes because that exacting lesson.

Everything about this particular task just annoyed her; it had for over a decade. Maddie had long ago stopped connecting that sentiment with the beating Michael had been given for burning their old dining room table and his father's shirt when the six year old had gotten up before both of them to try to help her get all the laundry done.

()()

The lady of the house had decided to make spaghetti. As long as she didn't get distracted and stood by the stove, constantly checking the pasta for doneness and making sure she didn't burn the sauce, it was one of the few dishes everyone in the house agreed was edible. Fortunately, there wasn't much you could do to screw up sauce from a jar. Once she'd determined which brand Frank approved of through torturous trial and error, it was safe to serve if she kept an eye on it and didn't let it overheat and burn.

With Frank not yet home, Michael asleep and Nate engaged in washing the Charger, it seemed a safe bet she would be able to stay attentive to her cooking. As Madeline blew another plume of smoke into the air, she prayed that her husband's business trip had gone well and there would be a calm evening, to which a good dinner would hopefully be her successful contribution.

She had been standing over the sink, filling the pot with water for spaghetti and checking up on Nate's progress with the car, when the front door crashed open.

"Yer dead meat, boy!" she heard her husband snarl. Rushing into the living room, she arrived just in time to see her eldest dodge the blow that Frank had aimed at his son's head. Fortunately for Michael, the noise and the coffee table in front of the couch had slowed his father down just enough for him to evade the roundhouse punch that had been intended for his jaw.

The down side in dodging that blow was that it left him with his head and upper body flat on the sofa and Frank didn't hesitate to wrap his large hands around Michael's throat before his older boy could maneuver away.

"Who the hell d'ya think ya are, gettin' me tangled up in that mess with them boys up in Broward?! Who tol' ya could drive muh gawd damn car, anyway?"

Mrs. Westen, who had been circling the combatants looking for an opening to intervene, now pulled back. She had only told her son that he could use his father's car because Frank was supposed to have been out of town. How had he found out that the Charger had even left the driveway?

"Can't tell you….if you keep…. choking me…." Michael ground out.

The senior Westen released one hand, allowing his firstborn some air, but immediately used his freed-up limb to cuff his offspring hard upside his head. "Whud the hell were ya doin' getting involved in transportin' hardware with them boys _in muh fooking car_, ya jackass? Ya think everyone in this town don' know whose car that is? Were ya tryin' t' git me killed, ya little bastard?"

Madeline looked from the rage infused visage of her spouse to the fury filled eyes of her child and knew the answer as well as they both did.

"Transporting hardware?" she stammered. "What are—"

"Stay the hell outta this, woman. I'll settle up with ya later!" Frank interrupted before she could finish her sentence. He turned his attention back to his progeny, tightening his grip on the teenagers' windpipe with both hands once more.

"That kid ain't just tied up with the mob, ya gawd damn fool idiot, he's got_ Special Forces_ after his ass too. Do ya think I tol' ya t'stay away from him jus' t'hear muhself talk? Ya wanna git us all killed?"

Michael's response was a choked wheeze.

"Frank, stop it!" Maddie demanded, circling around behind him and pulling on his arms, her oldest boy's respiratory distress spurring her into action. "Stop! You're choking him, he can't breathe! Stop it!"

"Ya think ya kin wreck muh car and git away wif it?" The angrier his father was, the thicker his native Georgia accent became. "Ya ever touch muh car agin…"

"Frank, damn you, let him go!" Michael's mother began to rain blows on her husband's back with one hand as she continued to tug on one of his arms with the other, her son starting to turn blue.

"Mike fixed the car!" Nate blurted out. The other Westen boy had snuck into the room as soon as he'd heard the shouting commence. He'd slowly crept from the safety of the kitchen to the nearby scene of his daddy squeezing the life out of his brother while his mother beat on the old man to no avail. But Madeline saw that her youngest had kept his distance, prepared to bolt on a moment's notice.

"Ya stay outta this, too, boy," Frank growled, but he paused long enough to look out the window and take in the undamaged vehicle sitting cleaned and gleaming in the driveway.

That was all distraction Michael needed. He raised both feet up and caught his sire squarely in the stomach with a double kick that sent both this parents crashing back into the coffee table and sprawling onto the floor. Staggering to his feet, he drew in a couple of ragged breaths before the eldest bolted out the front door with his sibling hot on his heels.

()()()()()

Madeline sat at her dining room table wrapped in her nightgown and bathrobe, smoking naturally as well as sipping on some bourbon. It was early in the afternoon, just after lunch time, but she felt justified in her choice of libation and her current state of dress. The ache in her body, both inside and out, necessitated the drink and her total lack of sleep and her shattered nerves required the balm of nicotine. The house was empty and quiet for once. Of the three males who resided here, only Nate had actually gone where he was supposed to, assuming he did in fact go to school.

Frank had been gone before she had gotten up for the first time this morning. When he had returned, her husband put the new coffee table he had purchased where the old one had stood without a word. She'd had Nate clean up the remnants of the broken table after her youngest had returned from tailing his brother over to Marvella Watkins' place. Madeline had waited with some trepidation as she handed him a cup of coffee, waiting to see If his good humor from last night had remained or if there was a rant about why the coffee table had been destroyed in the offing. Her body ached where she had broken his fall for him last night and she didn't think she could take another round of abuse this morning. Instead, Frank had set the cup aside and kissed her with a passion that hadn't been evident since they'd been dating. As he had walked her back to the bedroom, she was relieved that his mouth and his hands were definitely not hurting her on purpose this time.

The bone-weary blonde took another sip from the short glass and shook her head. Trying to keep up with her spouse's ever changing moods was exhausting. She inhaled deeply from the last of the cigarette she'd been smoking and exhaled even longer before snubbing out the butt in the overflowing ash tray. Frank preferred cigars on the whole and they took up a lot more room in the ceramic circle. She looked from the papers that Michael had dropped on the table to the new furniture in the living room and back.

When the senior Mr. Westen had stormed out of the house yesterday in the wake of his son, she'd had no idea where he'd gone. Maddie had guessed from what he had said before he left and what he said when he'd returned that he had been showing the Charger around town in all the right places to all the right people to let everyone know that the rumors he had been involved in an accident, much less a gun running deal, were unfounded. She knew that his "business partners" included some of the less than reputable men from the community as well as any number of low level "wise guys." South Florida was an open territory after all and every good Italian restaurant in the area had a very particular clientele.-

Apparently, Frank Westen had successfully concluded whatever business he had been about all week as well because he had come home inebriated, but in a celebratory mood. They'd had a pleasant dinner out, sans Michael of course whose name was never mentioned, and then he had sent Nate off with a handful of cash to the movies, suggesting a midnight matinee or two. Frequently, Frank's private trips often included side "commerce" and she could usually tell when he came home whether he had been mixing business and pleasure. But, based on his mood and how sore but sated she was this morning, there had been no involvement of the oldest profession in this particular professional venture.

Madeline lit her next cigarette and refilled her glass. Michael had caught her coming out of shower, startling her with his sudden appearance. A few minutes earlier and he might have caught… no, of course not, he was watching the house to make sure that his father was gone. Even as a nine year old, he'd had sense enough to do that.

She had mixed feelings the amount of time he spent at Mrs. Watkins' house. She was grateful that her boy had a refuge instead spending his nights on the streets, which he did more and more frequently thanks to the tension that grew daily between father and son, but part of her resented the bond Michael seemed to have with Ricky and Andre's mother.

She had babysat Ricky as an infant way back when, taking care of both him and Nate. That meant Andre and Michael were always hanging around in some proximity of her house. Frank had taken up truck driving shortly after Nate was born and was home infrequently. It had worked out well, as Marvella typically paid her debt in food brought home from the diner where she worked at the end of her double shift. Everyone was grateful from the improved quality of the cuisine at the Westen household.

If she was being honest, Maddie might have worked out that the fact that Mrs. Watkins had kicked her abusive husbands to the curb, both Andre's and Ricky's fathers, and had chosen to work instead was at the center of her ill feelings towards the woman. Michael certainly had made enough comments both subtle and not so subtle about how he thought his mother should have handled her martial problems.

However, now Andre was in jail, soon to be tried as an adult, and Michael….

His mother picked up the recruitment papers again. Sighing, she put the cigarette down, only to pick up the glass again and take a large swig of the burning liquid contents. What would become of her son?

Every time he came in the front door, he was either fighting with his father or slipping away before the fight could start and he was getting better and better at being gone, but gone where, doing what? What had started as petty theft, boasting cars and shop lifting to help the family had turned into something more; schoolyard fights had become street fights. He was gone for nights In a row. Where would it end?

Madeline flipped open the papers and stared at the words that would make her firstborn the property of the US government. He was already selling weapons apparently, would it be so terrible for him to use one in defense of his country? But how could she let him go like that? Who would defend Nate? Who –

She remembered the look on her boy's battered face as he'd set the papers done in front of her on the table, ignoring her request to sit down and talk to her.

"_If you didn't antagonize your father so much…"_

"_Ma, I antagonize him by EXISTING! There's not much I can do about that except die or leave. Here." _

_He threw the folded papers down on the table as she gasped at his words. _

"_This might accomplish both," the teenager declared. "All you have to do is sign it… and get him to sign."_

"_The Army, Michael? You can't be serious. Your father would never let you go into the Army."_

_Frank Westen had been too young for Korea, but too old for Vietnam and he had been an early adapter to the Rebel without a Cause mindset with a very healthy disrespect for the military, thanks to his own upbringing under the martial discipline of his drill sergeant stepfather . _

"_Yea, I get it. He'd prefer to beat me to death himself," the bitterness in her child's voice made her flinch. "I just thought I'd save him the trouble. Nate's old enough to steal his own groceries now."_

"_Michael," she reproached. "You know your brother looks up to you, you're his hero."_

_Her eldest made a disgusted noise. "Just cuz I bail him out all the time doesn't mean—"_

"_Michael, honey, please don't be like that. We need you here. We're your family."_

"_No, you need to—" He stopped and sighed in frustration, planting his hands on his hips and staring up above him as though his answers might be found in the patterns in the smoke encrusted popcorn ceiling._

"You know _how this is going to end, Ma," he told her flatly, finally looking her in the face again._

"_But, why the Army, Michael? You could—"_

"_You know when I left last night, I went to Miz W's and I talked to her about Andre," her son plowed ahead before she could interrupt. "And she talked to me about not ending up like Andre, not having dead or in jail being my only choices. She said she knew I was smart enough not to get caught like Andre did, smart enough not to get into a gang like Andre did and she said if I was smart enough for that, then I was smart enough to be whatever I wanted to be. You know what I want to be, Mom?"_

"_What, Michael?" His mother tried to keep her resentment under control over her first born not feeling like he could bring his problems to her. She had always assumed his love of Miz Watkins' house was due to its lack of adult supervision. But now, the guilt over not being there for him began to eat at her._

"_When Dad was talking about Special Forces, he was afraid. He's not afraid of the wise guys or the cops or the assholes he hangs around with, but he was afraid of them. He didn't want any part of those guys. That's what I want to be, Special Forces, and I have to start somewhere. The sooner I get out of here, the better, before something _really bad_ happens."_

Madeline finished off her drink in another big swallow and then smoothed the document out, bending the creases backwards so the papers lay flat. She went to the kitchen drawer and pulled out two different pens, one blue, one black. The key to forgery of side by side signatures was different ink, made it harder to see similarities in the handwriting. . She took a deep drag of her cigarette to stop the trembling in her hand before she could write own name convincingly, never mind Frank's messy scrawl.

It wouldn't be the first time she'd forged her husband's signature; it would just be the most painful.


	2. Miami Christmas 1984 - Part 1

**A/N: Much love and thanks as always to Amanda Hawthorne, Purdy's Pal and Obsidian Empress for reading through this and helping me with my writers block. Thanks to Daisy Day, BurnerNoelle and CJ for being the lovely people that they are. Love to all the Burner Girls on FB and Twitter and many thanks to everyone who keeps reading and reviewing while I try not to let RL impede my writing!**

()()

**Miami, Christmas 1984**

It had been with a huge exhalation of relief that Michael D. Westen, US Army Recruit, had stowed his gear in the overhead compartment of the L1011 TriStar aircraft and had settled into the aisle seat of the center row on the Delta Airlines plane that would eventually take him to Miami.

The flight had lasted two hours, give or take, the same amount time, more or less, it had actually taken him to travel from his posting in Fort Benning to Hartsfield –Jackson Atlanta International Airport. But somehow the two hour drive with his distant relatives, Shane J. Westen and his father Levi, had seemed more like two days or maybe even two months. He'd been so eager to get to the airport that the time had dragged insufferably, but once he had gotten into the air, thoughts of his destination had made the trip pass in the blink of an eye.

That he still had relatives at all living in his paternal point of origin, the great State of Georgia, had been news to him when he had encountered his second cousin twice removed in the reception center at Fort Benning. Standing with hundreds of other nearly naked and newly shorn men, who were both utterly bored yet equally shell shocked, was not the best of circumstances in which to conduct a family reunion of sorts. But at least it had gotten him a ride to Atlanta instead of having expend his meager money on a bus ticket or exercising his thumb.

An added twist of fate that had landed him with another Westen to take care of was the Army's fondness for the buddy system once basic training had commenced. Something in the DI's perverse sense of humor had given the man great delight in screaming out their mutual surnames and making them guess which recruit he had actually been addressing. The guy'd made Sergeant Foley look like a complete pansy. Still, in retrospect, it had been far easier than trying to keep his kid brother out of trouble, both in his house and out on the streets.

Mercifully, Shane had been in relatively good shape due to the southern obsession with high school football and Michael's years of martial arts had paid off in the first three brutal weeks of Red Phase training. They had survived long enough for the Christmas Exodus, those ten miraculous days either side of December 25th during which anything Army virtually came to a halt, to interrupt their basic training and allow them both as 17 year olds to go home on leave.

Not that he'd had any particular desire to return to the household he had escaped from roughly seven weeks earlier. But now that the eldest Westen boy had business to conduct back in Miami and very little in the way of liquid assets or resources with which to accomplish the trip, when his mother had suddenly come up with the cash for the plane ticket, he hadn't been inclined to argue. His alternative was three days by train or bus just to get back to South Florida, notwithstanding the three days that travel would consume on the other end of his leave. At the time, he'd decided that if he'd survived seventeen years, he could somehow manage to endure approximately seven more days if he had to.

Once he was airborne, the teenager outfitted in an Army uniform had finally allowed himself to be grateful for his distant relatives' early rising habits. Levi had insisted that he be out of Atlanta before rush hour traffic, which meant not only a pre-dawn departure from Fort Benning, but also plenty of time to catch the earliest possible flight back to Miami. This had enabled him to make better travel arrangements from the airport to his former home than having to contact his family for a ride.

With thoughts of his destination on his mind again, Michael tried to keep the ghosts of Christmas past at bay with little success. As if holidays didn't have enough potential for disaster, his mother would insist on a family portrait right before Christmas Eve dinner. The assumption that their hunger would ensure their cooperation normally had been sound. Her cooking had always been erratic enough without running the risk of letting it get cold. She'd done it before successfully for a number of years.

_But in 1982, as soon as his mom had brought out the Polaroid, his father had started harassing Nate about how unkempt his hair and clothing were for the picture, going as far to suggest that they return the younger boy's Christmas presents as he was obviously incapable of maintaining the new bike and various toys he'd received. It wasn't the worst thing his dad had ever done on Christmas, but the older Michael got, the less he could tolerate Frank Westen's abuses._ _Who the hell did the SOB think he was?_

Michael had snorted out loud then, caught up in the memory and earning an odd look from the senior citizen to his right who'd had her nose buried in her knitting up to that point. They both had smiled uncomfortably at each other for a moment and then looked away. The bright red garment on her lap…

_A homemade sweater…_ He'd shaken his head and had looked down the aisle, trying to distract himself from the reminiscence and failing miserably again.

_It wasn't so much that he had minded being given that hideous red-orange sweater she'd made for him as a Christmas present; he knew his mother was trying to save the money she had to get gifts for his little brother. Nate was a kid after all and his older brother had not only been earning his own money, and occasionally supporting the family, but he'd been buying his own clothes since middle school._

_No, it'd been her insistence in 1982 that he __wear it__ for the portrait that had ticked him off. That and dear old Dad's self-righteousness bullshit, including how ridiculous __he'd__ looked with his long hair and his over-sized print shirt. _Recruit Westen had run a hand over his nearly bald head then and sighed again. Looking back now, he realized his hair then had been so long and curly in the back and so flat on top that It had practically been a mullet. _But Jennifer had liked it that way, so…._ He'd supposed he should be grateful to the Army for cutting it all off before he went home. It would save a lot of arguments on both fronts.

_Michael had clearly recalled his father's appearance from his trucking driving days after Nate was born and it was anything but refined. Just because the old man had been upgrading his own wardrobe whilst hanging around the clubs and sucking up to the parasitic losers that teemed around wise guys didn't mean that Frank Westen was suddenly sophisticated. Finally, his antipathy had gotten the best of him._

_"Leave Nate alone. You don't keep anything up around here anymore, anyway, I do! You haven't for-" _

_Next thing he'd remembered, he was flat on the floor while his mother had been screaming that she was going to throw the whole dinner in the trash if they didn't line for the picture and quit fighting. _

_As it was, Nate had been the only who'd looked happy in the picture because as soon as his mom had realized how big a bruise was going to show up on her oldest son's cheek just below his eye, she'd had to cancel her plans to drag them all to church after dinner. She'd had to content herself with the photo and the silence as they all poured copious amounts of lumpy gravy over the dried out, over cooked turkey._

When he'd been asked by the stewardess to return his seat back and tray table to its secure and upright position, Madeline's son had finally shaken off the memories as the plane prepared to land.

It had only taken a moment of searching in the arrivals terminal of Miami International Airport to spot the person he was looking for. Mrs. Watkins, her tight mahogany curls wreathed in a halo of cigarette smoke, was heavily made up and hard to miss. He called out her name and she spun around smiling.

"Michael? Sweet thing, is that really you? Lord, child, what have they done to you?"

Despite the cigarette dangling precariously from her teeth and dangerously close his uniform, Recruit Westen still leaned in and let Marvella Watkins hug him as long as she wanted. It felt really good.

"Come on, sugar, let's get your stuff."

"Got it, Miz W," he assured her as he hefted the backpack onto his shoulder. The short, dark skinned woman in the four inch purple platform shoes and tight fitting mauve waitress uniform turned and headed towards the arrivals driveway, beaming warmly at the young man beside her.

"They ain't feeding you at all, are they? And I thought you was skinny before, mmm, mmm, what a shame. They sure ain't been spending my tax dollars on takin' care of you, baby!" Mrs. Watkins led him towards to her dark purple Cadillac Coup deVille. Her vehicle had originally been gold before he and Andre had been forced to give it a paint job in her favorite color to cover up its involvement in a hit.

"Thanks for coming to get me, Miz W," Michael said as he climbed into the passenger seat.

"Don' you worry none, darlin'. I know what it's like at your place, baby. You can always call me when you need somethin', ya hear?"

He smiled brightly at his best friend's mother. Yes, he had always been able to count of Mrs. Watkins.

"Do you remember the time that customer stiffed you on the tip and then accused me of stealing it?" The image of her dragging a man twice her size out of the diner by his ear, taking Michael's side and standing up for him, still had the power to lift his spirits, even after a decade.

"Damn fool done picked on the wrong boy that time," she chuckled. "I knew you would never do me like that, sugar." Her smile turned into a frown. "Now, If it had been 'dre or Nate…" she lamented and then brightened. "Stupid chump, I'd whupped his ass if I hadn't had a double dinner service goin'!'"

They chatted amiably on the ride back to his house, mostly about what the Army and the first part of basic training had been like. When she let him know that her oldest boy had gone back into the gang, her surrogate son was clenching his jaw in suppressed fury. His childhood best friend had made a promise to him. After Michael had helped him cover up being the wheel man on a driver by shooting using his mom's car, Andre had vowed that he would get out and stay out of gang life for good.

It seemed all too soon that they were parked in front of the curb of the house on Shady Lane and he let a very long, low breath, which then caused Mrs. Watkins to let loose with one of her famous gaffaws.

"You know my door's always open for you, sugar. You come on over whenever you want and we'll see what we can do about fattening you up, son." Her teeth flashed white as she grinned widely. "Though your mama's cooking might taste a tad bit better now that you been living on Army food."

He laughed out loud himself then, grateful to her for her attempt to ease the tension. Michael leaned over and kissed her on the cheek, coming away with some of her rouge on his face.

"Thank you," he said with a sincere smile, swiping at the coloring on his skin. "I just wanted to—"

"Go on now, git on out the car," Marvella ordered good-naturedly. "I gotta git to work, sweet thing."

The older Westen offspring soon found himself standing all alone on sidewalk, back pack in hand, staring at the front door and trying to work up the intestinal fortitude to go in. After a few moments, the young recruit knew with a certainty that he was not only in Miami to clear away the criminal activities from his past that would impede his entrance into the Army Special Forces, but also to cut all ties with his past. _Nothing_ was going to stop him from pursuing his future as an elite U.S. military man.

Michael had known from the instant he'd decided to be an Army Ranger that he would be perfect for the job. All the skills he'd acquired growing up in Westen household, out on the streets of Miami and in the surrounding environs of South Florida had served him in that choice. He was stealthy, aware of his environment at all times, physically well-conditioned, mentally tough, prepared for flight or fight at a moment's notice and thoroughly accustomed to getting smacked around. As far as Frank's son was concerned, he'd been groomed for Special Forces from the day he'd been born, intentionally or not.

His mother had mistaken his anxiety for "leaving home" jitters. But it'd been for her sake and Nate's that Michael had been concerned and feeling somewhat guilty over since he'd been _actually _walking away from _them_. Prior to that, his dominant emotion in dealing with his family had been resentment.

As he crept towards the driveway on the far side of the house, he was reminded again that he had been doing reconnaissance virtually since he was in kindergarten. That other thing the Army wanted him to do, that trusting his compatriots, that was less natural for him. He felt as though the whole relying on your buddies was in reality more like carrying their load as well as your own, one of the many things he'd left home to get away from. He had precious few people he trusted and, just like Andre, even the ones you had trusted could potentially betray you.

When he cleared the trees and the garage came into view, he was relieved to see the Charger was gone, but dismayed to see Madeline's burnt orange '72 Buick Skylark sitting there with the hood up and various tools and greasy engine parts scattered around the front of the car. Recruit Westen rapidly assessed where the majority of his leave was destined to be spent if he didn't figure out what was wrong with it quickly.

The young man hesitated at the entrance to the kitchen and set his backpack on the ground near his boot. It felt strange to be back. It certainly wasn't homesickness that had overcome him or a rush of fond memories that was overwhelming him, but some unnamed emotion held him rooted to the concrete outside the back door. He remembered when he had left here, ostensively to enter the Army with $50 bucks in his pocket, a change of clothes in his backpack and a shower of tears from his mother, but in truth he had gone to his girlfriend's home to hide out while he prepared for and passed the GED. The Army wouldn't take him without a high school diploma unless he got special waivers.

He'd been totally dismayed when the recruiter advised him they would see in June after graduation. There'd be no way in hell he was going to go back to that house for another six months, not a chance he was going to give the old man an occasion to change his mind after he'd miraculously signed the papers. Michael still didn't know what his mom had done to get Frank Westen's signature on those forms, but he wasn't going to hang around and take the beatings and the abuse from that bastard once there was an end in sight. Since it was obvious his Dad couldn't wait to get rid of him, it would be first class foolishness to stay within arm's reach of the man or let his guard down by sleeping under his roof.

So when the back door banged open and Madeline Westen emerged, perpetual cigarette in hand, it was hard to say who was more startled between mother and son. Michael couldn't exactly say he'd missed his mom and she barely recognized the bald, slim stranger in uniform standing on her driveway.

"Michael?" she questioned, like she didn't believe what her eyes were seeing.

"Uh, yeah, Ma…" _What do you say to that? Does the haircut and uniform make __that__ much difference?_

"Oh, Michael, honey, you're home!" She was down the stairs in an instant, crushing him in a bear hug.

"Mom, mom, please…. " He pulled away from her after a moment. "You burn it; I buy it."

_It wouldn't be the first time I'd paid for her mistakes_, he groused internally. But what he actually said was, "Where's Dad?"

Madeline rolled her eyes in the general direction of her dismantled vehicle, as she released her son and huffed. "Don't get me started about your father."

"What's wrong with the car now?" he asked, personally assured that he didn't really want the answer.

"I had to take Nate down to Biscayne Bay for a dentist appointment and it started making this really loud clicking noise and you know you have to drive through Little Haiti to get to his office. I was getting worried that if something happened—"

"Wait, wait, stop, when did the dentist move out to Biscayne?"

"The oral surgeon," she specified. "Nate had a tooth knocked out after school."

"When did _that_ happen?" Michael queried, already assuming that his father had done the deed.

The spiky blonde crossed her arms over her chest and fixed him with a glare. "Two weeks after you left those senior high kids that used to bother Nate figured out you were gone and jumped him after school." She took another drag of her cigarette. "I called and gave the principle a piece of my mind, but your father said he would handle it. "

Her son knew there was a "but" coming. "And…."

"I think he settled it with a baseball bat. You know, your daddy could have gotten in a lot of trouble, an adult hitting those boys, Michael. They would have never bothered Nate if you had still been here."

Her oldest son groaned out loud. He _had _settled it two years ago with just the _threat_ of a baseball bat.

"By the way, your brother is very upset that you didn't say goodbye to him before you left."

"Mom… " the teenager began in a pained voice. "Nate was at school when I left and you told me you didn't want me to be here when Dad got back from spending his day drinking and losing money on Jai Lai, remember?"

Sometimes his mother's selective memory could be a real pain. The day he'd left, his father had taken off with the "bill money" to go to Dania Jai Lai. She must've fallen trying to grab her husband and prevent him from leaving because that's where Michael had found Madeline, sitting on the stairs nursing a lot of scrapes and bruises, when he'd returned to from making arrangements with his girlfriend to move into her mom's condo.

_He'd given her all the money he had, save $50, and had only taken a change of clothes. The Army wouldn't have allowed him to bring any more cash and he couldn't arouse his mom's suspicions by taking more clothes. He'd had enough clothes at Jennifer's already to get by for near future. Caught between his anger over the situation and the reality of knowing that he wasn't truly going away to Fort Benning, but rather across town to hide out in an ocean front condo while he was "finishing" high school had caused the lump that had formed in his throat. _

"Well, at least you'll be here when Nate gets home from school." Maddie paused as she saw the wariness in his expression. "Won't you?"

Her car being broken down presented him with a big problem. Michael had a meeting after working hours downtown off Southeast 5th Street at the Brickell on the River condos and he didn't plan on missing it; however, he didn't plan on having to steal a car to get there either. That was _not _something he needed to get involved in as a recruit trying to get into the Rangers. He was here to try to clean up his criminal background, not add to it.

He closed his eyes for a second and tried to recall where the Metrobus stop closest to the house was.

"You're not going to stay and help fix the car?" the older woman demanded, affronted he might do otherwise.

"Fine," Michael snapped. He picked up his bag and headed towards the side entrance. He had a little time, but he needed to change into some work clothes before he got anywhere near that dirty, grimy oil-encrusted mess.

"It's so good to have you back home, honey," Maddie rejoiced as her wayward boy flung open the back door.

"Yeah, just great," he retorted as he disappeared into the house. As Frank's son passed through the kitchen, he noticed the greasy fingerprints everywhere, fingerprints _he_ would have gotten a beating for had he been here to be accused of making them. An intense bitterness rose up in Michael as he passed through the laundry room towards his old bedroom. But what he saw when he opened that door left him speechless, albeit momentarily.

_What the f-? _ He stood there blinking at the virtually empty room so long it attracted his mother's attention. The book shelves were gone, his model airplanes, his martial arts trophies, his Star Wars spacecrafts that had sat upon them missing as well. Nothing was left in the room but the bed and the worn-out dresser that he'd had his entire life. Even his second hand TV and his new stereo were gone.

"Where's my stuff?" he questioned fiercely, rounding on Madeline as she joined him in the doorway.

"Well, we didn't hear a word from you for weeks, Michael, and your father just thought you wouldn't be coming back here for any of it, so he took it down to the pawn shop. I saved some of it for you, your model airplanes and some of your books and papers, that sort of thing. They're in the closet."

Michael crossed the room in three long strides and threw the wooden door open so hard it smacked against the wall. It was bare of his things except the two cardboard squares on the floor with his name on them. "What the hell, he even took _my clothes_ to consignment?"

"You didn't need them when you left for the Army, that's what you told me," the blonde countered. "Those old T-shirts and ripped-up jeans you used to wear working on the cars are still in the dresser."

Michael clenched his eyes, mouth and fists tightly shut, trying to get his spiraling anger back under control. He had taken hell off of a professional asshole, an Army drill instructor for three weeks, and he had never once been as close to losing it as he was right now. _Now he needed clothes __and __a car._

"You know, Michael, if you stayed here and gotten a scholarship like Mrs. Reynolds' daughter instead of going away to the Army, then-"

"I'm going to see Jennifer," he announced through gritted teeth. He'd taken most of the things he could that he'd needed or cared about, including his better clothing, to his girlfriend's place weeks ago. The only upside in this whole disaster was that condo was not too far from where he had to be tonight.

"umm, Michael…"

Something in Madeline's voice sent a wave of dread washing over him. He knew she wasn't going to complain about him not working on the car. No, that tone had only one purpose: to deliver bad news.

"I don't know how to tell you this, honey," she said, looking down at the carpet. "But I ran into Patrick Carney's mother at the grocery store. You remember Patrick, tall, blonde kid from your high school?"

The young man turned around slowly and gazed upon the woman who had given birth to him with a blank expression as Michael tried to recall why anything should upset him about Patrick Carney, a jock with more money than brains that he'd had little use for since junior high. _Did he die or something?_

"Well, you see, he proposed last week to… uh, Jennifer. Apparently they've been seeing each other since… I wasn't sure if she'd told you yet, but I didn't want you to go over there and be surprised. Of course, you shouldn't be surprised because if you'd have been here instead of taking off and …."

The rest of what his mother said failed to penetrate his consciousness. No, Patrick Carney wasn't dead.

Because he was going to _kill him_.

TBC

_If anyone is interested you can hear Madeline and Michael discussing this scenario about Michael learning Patrick Carney had stolen his girlfriend during his first leave from the Army in Episode 5.05 Square One. The story of Michael's black eye on Christmas in 1982 can be found in Episode 2.11 Hot Spot._


	3. Miami Christmas 1984 - Part 2

**A/N: Much love and thanks as always to Amanda Hawthorne for the BETA and reading thru, to Purdy's Pal for reading thru and letting me borrow a bit of background mentioned in Raindrops and First Times. Thanks to Daisy Day, BurnerNoelle and CJ for being the lovely people that they are. Love to all the Burner Girls on FB and Twitter and many thanks to everyone who keeps reading and reviewing while I take forever between updates. RL can be such a pain sometimes!**

**()()**

** Miami Christmas 1984 – Part 2**

_How could she? How dare he? Who did that SOB think he was?_

Michael's sulfurous thoughts rampaged around his head as his efforts to distract himself by attempting to repair his mother's car failed miserably. Clad in his faded and ripped denims, threadbare V-neck and worn Dolphins cap to protect his stubble covered head from the Miami sun, which would burn newly exposed skin even in the dead of winter, he stalked around the cracked concrete that constituted the driveway of his childhood home like the caged animal.

His thoughts flowed in endless cycles of outrage over how he had been misused by those who should have been closest to him. Everything he touched or looked at reminded him of yet another offense that had been previously given. His family, his girlfriend, his friends…the list of people he could actually trust not to betray him seemed to be getting shorter all the time…

Virtually everything that he was now using in his endeavor to fix the dismantled vehicle had come from five finger discounts or midnight supply. It had always been his job to distract the sales clerks and scrap yard managers. Getting into arguments and faux fights, which sometimes had gotten all too real, even going so far as to fake a seizure so his father could steal spark plugs… the parts, the tools, even the shop supplies all had reminiscences attached to them that were unpleasant, illegal or both.

As he made yet another circuit of the driveway, he could see his mother peering out of the window, but she'd made no attempt to come outside and offer her interminable advice. Somehow, his launching of one, and then the other, of the dented metal trash cans towards the street early on in the process of him trying to divert his anger, had let her know that now was not a good time to tender her views on how he could have lived his life better.

Circling back to the front end of the auto near the entrance to the garage, where he had set his backpack just inside the door, Michael tried to make sense once again of what his father had done to her Skylark. He explored the collection of engine parts scattered about the worn driveway like Quincy, M.E. perusing an especially brutal crime scene. But the unhappy familiarity of his current situation kept his mechanical acumen from functioning at a level sufficient to resolve this particular case of vehicular homicide.

Many were the times he'd returned from school with a half completed construction or repair job awaiting him, including a "to do" list and a deadline from dear old dad; that he had homework to do was never a consideration, never mind any personal plans. The only difference was _there were no instructions_ of any sort left behind and he had no idea what the hell Frank Westen had been up to this time.

Being enraged over the bastard stealing and then pawning almost everything he'd owned, while his mother had apparently stood idly by for the most part, was better than thinking about the betrayal by his girlfriend, Jennifer Drummond, but just barely… That she was _already engaged_ to…..

As the teenager made another pass-by, his eyes immediately zeroed in on the back seat. He took a moment to wonder at all the ways they'd managed to have sex in that relatively tiny space in the back of the Buick and then another moment to miss the feel of her body underneath his, to miss her arms wrapped around him, to miss her cooing his name with affection and almost with adoration in her voice…

The willowy blonde had arrived during the second year of junior high, everyone vying for the attention of the good looking, instantly popular and well off daughter of a highly successful, albeit recently divorced and recently relocated New York realtor. That is, everyone but the sullen class "bad boy" that few dared to cross any longer, who always had on very expensive jeans and high-end jackets, despite the blazing heat and the lowered income expectations of the families who lived in his part of the school district.

Michael always had plenty of girls throwing themselves at him, both at school and after dark at the clubs and on the beaches, but she was the first female who had seemed interested in him for just... him.

Staring at his distorted features in the shiny auto glass, his vision shifted and the face of Patrick Carney, rich, privileged, self-absorbed, arrogant Patrick Carney, sneered back at him, reminding the once dark haired youth yet again that anything he had could be taken away from him at any time.

As the oldest Westen boy clenched and raised his fist, it occurred to Michael that there were better ways of resolving this problem that wouldn't involve spending time replacing the car window or tending to cut and bruised knuckles. It was time Patrick Carney learned the meaning of loss as he had.

Even if it was just the loss of a few of his teeth this time…

()()()

_When you have to get information about an enemy position, you have a choice. You can watch from a distance slow and safe. Or you can go inside and take a look -quick, but potentially fatal. _

Having double timed it to Mr. Carney's residence, nestled in an exclusive part of the Lummus Park Historic District west of downtown Miami, Michael was pumped up and ready for a fight. The adrenaline coursing through his veins and his physical conditioning promised to deliver a proper pounding to his enemy, which made it all the more frustrating when he arrived at his target's location and found it overflowing with people and vehicles.

Glaring at the expansive white-washed stone walls and the deep orange barrel tile roof of the Mediterranean Revival style home, the young Army recruit decided to be grateful for the fact that this specific architectural vernacular also called for heavy landscaping in which to conceal himself.

Ducking into the midst of a high, thick fichus hedge, he surveyed the situation and contemplated his options, as a parade of his former classmates from Miami Senior High School streamed towards the home of the Miami City Commissioner who was the stepfather of his adversary.

_Scouting security from a distance is mainly just a matter of observation. You set up in a concealed place and watch incoming vehicles, personnel and weapons. Getting additional information usually requires a more direct approach._

Knowing that he couldn't approach that group without risking exposure, he then angled towards a less impressive structure two doors down where Mr. Westen found a potentially inexhaustible source of information, which would hopefully be less capable of identifying him should anyone ask. Normally, the young man would have helped virtually any little old lady retrieve her groceries from the trunk of her land yacht, but in this given instance, he was highly motivated to assist, twisting his cap backwards as he advanced.

Two glasses of iced tea later, excessively sweet ones in Michael's opinion although he could probably use the glucose having not eaten yet today, the young man had not only learned that virtually the entire senior class was attending his rival's 18th birthday cum Christmas party, but that Mr. Carney was expecting a motorcycle as a present for those two occasions.

This made Michael very happy, since motor bikes were far easier to steal that automobiles and he happened to have just the pen knife in his pocket to accomplish the task. Even better, this would solve his transportation issue and his need for retribution in one fortuitous combination of circumstances.

As the new recruit crept through the backyards of Patrick's neighbors, he was equally pleased to note that the majority of them did not have fencing either between the houses on this street, nor between the yards of the homes that backed up to the Carney residence. This meant if he could get the bike unseen from wherever it was being kept through the dense ornate landscaping and along the property line of the dwelling behind, when he fired up the motor, a very noisy thing indeed, then his pursuers, being on the wrong street, would hear the bike, but not be able to see it. It turned the odds of his escaping a likely multi-vehicle car chase highly in his favor.

As he approached the foliage, Michael could hear that arrogant voice loud and clear. _"Gentlemen, and the rest of you assholes,"_ Patrick could be heard laughing at his own joke. _"I give you the Kawasaki KZ550 LTD."_

The rest of his speech was lower and unintelligible; however, by the time Michael was peering through the hedge, he could tell by the motions of the blonde's long arms that descriptions of the power and capabilities of the "fire truck red" piece of Japanese engineering were the topic of conversation.

_"And this,"_ he concluded as his hand swept over the slightly raised black leather seat behind the rider's side, "_is where sweet Jennifer will ride."_

There was a chorus of hormone-fueled catcalls from the assembled teenaged males, to which Michael was almost sure he'd heard Patrick respond _for now_. It was hard to tell for sure with his blood boiling in his ears the way it was.

About that time a cargo van came lumbering down the street and pulled into the circular drive, passing the main garage where everyone was gathered and parking on the far side of the elegant abode, near the entrance to the pool deck. As their short attention spans were diverted to the new arrival, a murmur went through the assembly as the rear doors opened and two very large males jumped out, to be immediately joined by two equally muscle bound delivery men exiting the front driver's and passenger's sides.

When they unloaded the gigantic white crate and began to carry it towards the house palanquin-style, the crowd surged towards it, with cries of _stripper_ on their lips and the bike abandoned and forgotten behind them. Both envious and elated, Michael could not believe his luck as he stared the discarded motorbike, complete with a matching red riding jacket, gloves and helmet sitting forsaken on the seat as well.

He chuckled to himself, waiting for the last of the party goers to disappear around to the pool deck at the rear of the house. If he timed it right, the two-stroke engine roaring to life could coincide perfectly with the girl busting out of the "cake," a perfect counterpoint to the anticipated cheers and hoots.

_When it comes to security, the difference between a spy and a regular thief is that a thief gets to take what he wants and run. A spy has to go back to the scene of the crime the next day and act like nothing happened. It makes the approach a little more delicate_.

Moving towards his intended acquisition with a confident stride, Michael smiled even wider then he realized that his adversary had provided him with the perfect cover. Worst case, if anyone spotted him while he was walking towards the garage, he could claim to be an unintentionally uninvited guest. But once he had donned the riding gear, he could be any opportunistic thief who had taken advantage of the homeowner's overconfident negligence.

He stuffed his hat into his back pocket and then Mr. Westen slipped quickly into the riding gear which would render him anonymous, broke the steering lock with two quick jerks of the handlebars and then began the dangerous but thrilling job of wheeling the bike off the property and onto the street behind it. He felt an almost orgasmic rush of triumphant adrenaline surge through him as he twisted the pen knife and kick started the engine to life, now thoroughly enjoying the blast of noise that accompanied his departure and announced Patrick Carney's disgrace to the entire block.

()()

Unfortunately for Michael, that exhilaration was short lived. Once the primal, possessive side of his brain, or possibly a lower part of his anatomy, was satisfied that retribution had been served, the higher functioning logical part of his brain, which had previously played willing accomplice to the larceny, was now calculating the risks involved in being caught on a stolen bike and realizing he could hardly confront his unfaithful girlfriend riding her new lover's purloined present.

The answer to his problem presented itself in the form of Harold Higgins, older brother to his deceased friend Billy Higgins and former leader of the gang Andre was currently running with. There were only two dark purple Cadillac's sporting "black pearl" paint jobs on the streets of Miami that he knew of. One belonged to his childhood best friend's mother and the other belonged to the man who had helped him and Andre turn Mrs. Watkins' Coup deVille from its factory gold paint job to its current dark color.

Since he knew the former was at work and only the latter had an audio system capable of shattering all the windows in South Beach, it was a reasonable conclusion that the vehicle two-car lengths ahead of him on Flagler Street blaring rap music loud enough to penetrate his motorcycle helmet was none other than the owner of one of Miami's premiere chop shops and a likely buyer of the stolen goods he was currently sitting astride.

Michael knew better than to come at him quickly. So he slowly maneuvered the bright red bike between the stopped traffic until he came alongside the monstrous ride. Hoping that the older man had been watching his approach and he wasn't about to meet the business end of a MAC-10, the teenager quickly flipping up the helmet's visor and called out, "Yo, Triple H!"

To call Harold Henry Higgins anything other than "Triple H" was to invite death, or a serious ass whipping at the very least. Mr. Higgins' mother had been a part-time chorus girl, part-time waitress, which is how her son came to be acquainted with Mrs. Watkins' boy, Andre. Her love of musicals did not translate to her offspring, particularly once her firstborn was old enough to realize who he'd been named after since his biological father was long gone.

The dulcet tones of RunDMC ceased as the driver recognized him "Damn, Mad Dog, whatcha doin' back in the hood? Thought you was gone, man."

Michael shrugged. "Christmas leave, TCB… you know…"

"Yeah, so I heard," Mr. Higgins chuckled darkly. "Sweet ride."

"Yeah." Michael pulled a face that made his friend laugh even harder before he asked, "You on your way to the shop?"

"Matter o' fact, I am, my man. What can I do for my favorite white boy?"

"Tell you when we get there."

Misters Westen and Watkins had found favor with the elder Higgins boy when they had remained behind with Harold's little brother as the unfortunate Billy Higgins had bled out on the sand after a beach fight between rival Dade and Broward County neighborhood gangs, both of whom had chosen to crash this particular spring break party of vacationing college kids and subsequently had decided to flee, save those two friends, when the young man's throat had been slashed with a box cutter.

Earning the gratitude of Triple H had been more than worth bearing Frank Westen's displeasure over him being involved in the homicide investigation. That they'd told Harold more than they told the detectives, allowing his brother to bring Billy's murderers to justice himself, had brought Andre into the fold and had earned Michael a free pass in parts of Miami most people, and often the police, chose not to venture.

While making a quick perusal of the shop, seeing that little had changed since his last visit, Frank's son felt the buzz that had always accompanied the sound of air tools and the whiff of mineral spirits. He was reminded that working with his father at "Uncle Dougie's" place was actually one of the few pleasant memories he had connecting anything automotive with his Dad.

Heading towards the office in the back, there was an exchange of greetings and gangland handshakes before Michael got down to business. Triple H's professional opinion of the resale possibilities of the Kawasaki was blunt, especially after the bike's point of origin was established.

"Shit, man," he snorted. "Tha' bitch's way too hot. I ain't gettin' burned."

Mr. Westen had to concede that getting burned was a bad thing indeed and asked if Mr. Higgins could hold onto to the bike and the gear for a while because, long story short, Michael needed to borrow a car _now_ to take care of some business of which Harold seemed all too aware. The information superhighway of 80's Miami was the grapevine, which ran from the kids in school to the kids on the streets on up the line. Apparently, his cuckolding was a matter of public discourse as well as amusement, which only served to elevate the urgency of his need to get to his destination. Billy's big brother agreed that Michael needed to TCB and that he would store the bike for him.

As he drove away in Harold's cousin's metallic mint green 1963 Tempest, Michael was admonished one last time that the vehicle needed to be back before dinner or more than the car would be turning into a pumpkin, so to speak. Acknowledging the favor, he eased the Pontiac into traffic and headed towards home of his seemingly now former girlfriend. The fact that he had intended to break up with her on this trip was completely irrelevant.

()()

Michael was totally tangled up in his emotions, stewing in the mixture of heartache and humiliation, so much so that when he spotted her standing on the sidewalk in front of her Art Deco Revival home near Lower Brickell, he completely forgot about concealing the car and walking up to her house.

Standing in the sunlight on her ubiquitous Candies stilettos and squeezed into her perennial Calvin Klein jeans complemented by a deep pink, beaded cocktail shirt, her flimsy, nearly transparent white silk over-shirt and the waves of her long, blonde curls streaming away from her face and shoulders in the light breeze, she drew him like the proverbial moth to the flame.

As he exited the car and approached her, they stared at each other for a long time. He knew by her stance that she was critically eying his shabby clothing and his scrounged vehicle from behind her Anne Klein sunglasses.

Even in his own mind, the contrast of what he was wearing to what he normally would have been wearing was pretty pathetic. That he'd been reduced to confronting her dressed like this only served to fuel the broiling animosity towards the world in general and his family in particular; that she'd once been the balm to that pain and was now another source of it made the ache is his heart even deeper and the fire in his gut burn hotter.

"Nice haircut," she remarked finally, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Did you get kicked out of the Army and come back to go into the repo business or are you here to try to take me to Patrick's party in that hooptie?"

"I'm on leave," he answered tightly, trying to keep his hands from curling into fists. "And you obviously don't need my help hooking up with Patrick."

"_Thanks so much_ for letting me know you were coming home on leave," she shot back. "Six weeks, Michael? You've been gone six damned weeks and not a word, not a phone call, not a letter, not even a frickin' postcard! You got on a frickin' bus and you just frickin' disappeared. You promised me-"

"I was in training," he protested vehemently. "And I didn't know if I was going to be able to get leave, never mind get here. Shit happens."

She crossed her arms over her beaded shirt. "So,what? You couldn't_ call_ me before you showed up here? Did you want to surprise me? _Sw-eet, Mi-chael_, I'm surprised; surprised you had the nerve to show your face here!"

"Me? What about you? I have to find out from _my mother_ that you're engaged to Patrick Carney? That didn't take very fucking long!"

"_That's _what she told you? _Get real!_ And you just believed the Mouth of the South instead of _talking to me_ first?" Jennifer demanded incredulously.

"Sure seems like everyone else knows about it, too," he countered hotly.

"_That's_ what this is about? _Your rep?_ _That's_ what you came over here for?"

"No, I need the clothes I left here," the young man blurted out without thinking, his mission and his temper getting in front of his brain.

The blonde's mouth hung open for a couple of seconds and then twisted down into a snarl as her astonishment quickly morphed into hurt and then immediately went on to become the fury of a woman scorned.

"You can go to hell, Michael Westen!" she spat and turned on her four inch heels to fly through the white wrought iron gate, flinging it shut, and back up the brick paver walkway into her home. The sound of the front door slamming shut, frosted in-set window vibrating in concert with the force, snapped him out of his own state of shock and sent him dashing after her.

"Jennifer!" he shouted as he skidded to halt at the cold white metal barrier between them. He managed to stop himself before he could bang on it, but only just. He sucked in a deep breath to calm himself, realizing he could hear her stifled sobs emanating from just the other side of the door. _Crap! _

His felt his frustration begin to mix with guilt, a feeling he thoroughly and utterly detested. His mother had used it to manipulate him so many times that, even when his actions did merit a remorseful response, the eldest Westen boy did everything in his power to avoid experiencing the emotion.

"Jen? Jen, please, open the door. I'm sorry..." Michael wasn't sure what he hated more, begging or apologizing. The combination of the two made him almost sick, but he was desperate. "I… I didn't mean it that way…I just—"

_Now_ he was going to have to add personal confession to the list of things he despised and was about do. _Why did life have to be so fucking complicated?_

"I just got back… an' my Dad … pawned my stuff…" he nearly choked on the words. "And my mom's car was broken down. I had to hitch over to borrow a car to come see you….I can't wear my uniform on the street and this was all I had left. I _wanted_ to see you… but after what she said, I just thought…"

A humongous lump rose up in his throat and he swallowed hard, suddenly grateful that she couldn't see him as he confessed his vulnerability. She was one of the few he'd ever let his guard down with, but it had always been short words spoken in the shadows and after some sort of sexual euphoria.

With no clothes to cover the burns, bruises and abrasions on his body and no desire whatsoever to discuss the assaults that had caused them, his relations with her and every other woman he had ever bedded in his life had always taken place under the cover of darkness, natural or otherwise.

So, when the door slowly opened to reveal her tear stained face, Michael wasn't sure if it was the length of his confession or the fact he'd done it in the daylight that had moved her and he really didn't care which. He just _knew_ he was never going to have to do that again for the rest of his life.

"Whoa," she said softly. "That's a lot coming from the guy who never wants to talk about it." The blonde pulled the door farther open and stood aside, motioning for him to enter. "That so sucks what your Dad did to you."

Michael walked slowly into the Drummond household where he had spent more time than his own home during the last six months of his time in Miami. He had always admired the sharp, clean lines and minimalist decor unlike the 70's vibe, which was best described as shabby chic, that his mother had chosen. But now, as he looked everywhere but at his former girlfriend, he realized just how cold and sterile it looked, perpetually and unnaturally sanitary and organized, as though no one actually lived here.

As he finally let his eyes settle on her, he saw the longing to fill that same emptiness etched on Jennifer's face and he remembered what had finally drawn him to her: their mutual loneliness at heart, the need to know that _someone_ _actually cared about_ _them_. But if she was engaged to Patrick, why was she still looking at _him_ like that?

"I didn't mean to hurt you, Jen, I—"

"Which time, Michael?" she asked unhappily.

He stared her blankly as she blotted at her smudged mascara and streaked rouge with a tissue. Closing the space between them, the girl continued.

"Which time didn't you mean to hurt me? When you so totally dissed me by leaving and not a word from you after two years of knowing each other or when you showed up here kirking out on me for screwing around on you?"

"I'm sorry… I couldn't write or call when I was in training," he answered immediately, fixing on the first offense since he had good defense for that one, or at least he thought he did. He stepped closer, too. "I had to focus—"

"Yea, I know how you are when you focus," Jen huffed. "One week with the GED manual, you pass the test and you jet. Fantabulous! Meanwhile, who cut classes all week to help you study? Who covered for you and hid you out from your family, from everyone, in my mom's condo? And then you show up here asking for your stuff? Smooth move, lover boy, real smooth."

Her former beau chewed on his upper lip and tried to think of any response, let alone an adequate one. He _had _done everything she'd just accused him of. "You know how important it was…_it is_ to me, getting into the Rangers."

_"I know_ it was important to you. That's _why_ I helped you. I just thought _I _was important to you, too." He swallowed thickly as her blue eyes, bright with unshed tears, stared into his own.

"And then what, Michael? I read the stuff you brought back from the recruiter. You still have the rest of basic to complete, then AIT training, Ranger training and then you get deployed…. And you thought you could what? Disappear on me again and again and I should just be okay with that? You come back whenever and everything will be like it was when you left?"

The young recruit couldn't admit it to her, but that was exactly what he'd thought in the beginning. He hadn't thought about how it would impact her life. He hadn't thought beyond getting out of his house and into a career that would take him as far away from home as possible as often as possible.

"Michael, that's just mental," Jennifer declared hopelessly. "What's the point of _being_ with someone if you're never going to _be with_ _someone_?"

The teenager realized then that he had come to this same conclusion as he'd been standing on the curb outside his former home: he couldn't do what he needed to do to succeed, _and he had to succeed_, and still be tied to _anyone_.

He stepped into her personal space and laid a hand on her cheek, his thumb brushing over where the wetness had caused some of her intense blue eye shadow and pink over shadow to mingle with her dark pink rouge; it almost looked like a bruise and it was disturbing. He looked at her with resignation.

"I'm sorry, Jen. I get it and it's my fault. I get why you slept with Patrick."

What he didn't get was why he was suddenly on the receiving end of a powerful slap that staggered him, whipping his head to the side, leaving his cheek stinging and his perpetual inner rage flaring.

"You bastard!" she snapped and turned to storm away from him.

In the next instant, Ms. Drummond found herself gripped by the shoulders with strong hands that dug into her flesh and spun her around. Looking into heated blue orbs that contained barely suppressed violence, she froze. Although she'd seen him patent the "Westen Death Stare" over the two plus years she'd known him, it had never before been turned in her direction.

It was the appearance of real fear in her eyes that broke through the red taint of his vision and Michael loosened his hold and shifted back away from her, totally appalled at the very thought of what he _could have_ done to her.

"I didn't sleep with Patrick," she told him tearfully. "He took me to school stuff…football games…. dances… things you never wanted to go to. What was I supposed to do, Michael? Sit by the phone, wait by the door, put my life on hold until you had time for me or you needed something from me?"

Because she was right and because he could think of nothing else to say, Michael gradually pulled her into a light embrace and kissed her as gently as he could, pressing his forehead to hers when he finally released her mouth.

She sniffled and twisted her hands in the worn cotton of his Hanes V-neck. "Just because that tard proposed to me doesn't mean I was going to say yes; I was waiting for you. But you didn't trust me, did you? You'd rather believe all the jive talking about me than _just_ _talk to me_," she lamented.

Years of home survival training, martial arts and street smarts completely failed him. He had no preparation in the art of open, honest interactions and virtually no experience. He'd confused sexual gratification with affection for so long that he was only starting to figure out that there _was_ a difference.

The blond dropped her hands from his chest and slid them slowly around his waist, pulling him to her and burrowing herself in his embrace, laying her cosmetic smeared cheek over his heart as she had done so many times before. When she spoke again, her voice was forlorn and full of dejection.

"_Obviously,_ you don't trust me and apparently _I_ can't trust _you._ So where does that leave us?" She was trembling ever so slightly as she concluded.

He drew back and looked upon the girl he'd hurt deeply without meaning to with sorrowful but confused eyes, the scrunch in his eyebrows and the tilt of his head telling her what he couldn't, or actually wouldn't, say out loud.

Jennifer met his gaze and shook her head sadly. "You better hope you don't end up anywhere more dangerous than Grenada cuz you're not as slick as you think you are. You think the power suit crowd doesn't gossip more than the home girls? I know what you were doing and who you were doing when you were going out at night. They were my mom's drinking buddies, you know. I still forgave you for that. I thought it had stopped once we were more than just dating...at least, I thought we were more..."

He opened his mouth to protest, but his words dried up on his lips at her knowing stare. He was worse than a hypocrite. He'd accused her of doing something she hadn't done that he had done… more than once.

"I thought I could _love you_ enough, _had loved_ _you_ enough to make up for what happened to you growing up, to change all that. I thought you loved me, too, Michael, but I can see I was an airhead to think that you even have a clue what it means to love somebody like that."

She heaved a desolate sigh and disentangled herself from his embrace. She leaned up and kissed him lightly on the cheek that she had smacked the moment before and then moved deliberately toward the front entryway.

"Your stuff's in the concierge office at the condo, all of it. Just use the pass code from before. I didn't change it, you know," the blonde instructed.

Jennifer Drummond, his first and assumedly his last girlfriend, held the door open expectantly, her face yet another mask underneath her ruined make-up, revealing nothing. "I'm sorry, but it's over."

The young man felt stunned, rooted to the spot, and then his legs moved him forward of their own accord. He paused in front of her, needing to say something, but his mind refused to cooperate and nothing came out.

"Goodbye, Michael. I hope you find what you're looking for."

TBC


	4. Atlanta Christmas 1984 - Part 3

**A/N: Much love and thanks as always to Amanda Hawthorne for the BETA and reading thru, to Purdy's Pal for reading thru and helping plot Mikey's holiday. Thanks to Daisy Day, BurnerNoelle and CJ for being the lovely people that they are. Love to all the Burner Girls on FB and Twitter and many thanks to everyone who keeps reading and reviewing while I take forever between updates as always.**

()()

**Atlanta, Christmas 1984 – Part 3**

Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport was large, busy and noisy, to the point of being barely more than orchestrated chaos. It was the perfect place to sit back and watch the Christmas crush of harried travelers trying to return to their post holiday destinations. Picking a corner table in the very back of one of the ubiquitous airport eateries that had a good view of the baggage claim, the US Army Recruit had a good vantage point from which to watch for his ride back to Fort Benning as well.

Being the only major commercial airport near the base, there were plenty of military men milling about or heading out in their Class A greens. By alternating between pretending to study a menu and repeatedly reading a two day old edition of the Atlanta Journal Constitution, he kept from having to salute every five seconds since virtually everyone except the civilians in the airport outranked him.

Levi Westen and his cousin Shane were over two hours past the time appointed for picking him up. Michael had made a few trips to the pay phone with no results and was loath to give up his current position to make another call. Obviously, _something else_ had gone wrong, a most fitting end to his first leave, since very little of it had gone as he had planned it would when he'd sat in this place six days ago.

He'd given up on trying to get the pretty brunette server to come to grips with the term, "un-sweet" iced tea and had ordered a hot tea and two glasses of water instead. She had been sympathetic to his "cash poor" plight, or maybe it had been the charming smile and the lingering kiss on the knuckles as he had taken her hand to thank her for her kindness that had landed him the free slice of pecan pie a couple of hours ago. Trouble was, the dessert had been overly sugary for his tastes, although he'd supposed that the nuts contained some sort of nutrition, but it had only made him hungrier once eaten.

Frank's son had chuckled internally as the flustered girl had moved away, remembering all the times his father had called him "S_lick"_ with hints of admiration and pride, as well as just a modicum of jealousy woven into the sarcasm. That particular term was certainly the kindest form of address that the oldest boy could recall his dad directing at him. The Westen charisma, which his sire employed regularly to get his way with his mother and other people, had apparently been passed on to him along with his elder's looks, though hard drinking, chain smoking and rough living had changed the old man not for the better

Of course, Frank Westen had other means of persuasion if his personal magnetism failed to do the job. Though he didn't know it, Michael had been subtly absorbing the way in which the head of the family chose whether charm, intimidation or subterfuge was required to get what he wanted, even if what he wanted was to have it both ways sometimes, frequently to the detriment of those around him.

Thinking about the blushing waitress soon had his mind drifting back towards _la chica bonita_ at the concierge who had been more than willing to help him get into Jennifer's mom's condo and out of his clothes when he attempted to shower off and change before his meeting down at the lawyer's condo.

_He'd returned the borrowed car to Harold in a daze after he had left Jennifer's house for what was most assuredly the last time and soon found himself sitting in the chop shop owner's private office, sucking down a couple of cold Colt 45's with a Hennessey chaser until Mr. Higgins had decided his homey was fortified enough to drive away on his stolen bike. The lack of food, the liquor and the shock had totally reinforced the resulting paranoia that all came together at once as Michael had turned off Flagler Street onto US 1 and spotted two of Metro Dade's finest hanging out near the corner on the next block._

_His father arguably might not have taught him much of value, but he had taught his son to never run from law enforcement unless they were already giving chase__,__ and then it needed to be as short a run as possible. Since there had been only five city blocks remaining between himself and his destination at that point, the young man had eased down the six lane divided highway, finally releasing the breath he'd been holding when he saw the squad cars were empty and the would-be occupants were elsewhere. _

_He'd gone just past his intended location, turning left quickly into the parking lot of First Presbyterian Church of Miami and then veering towards the walkway that cut through Brickell Park, which was__ essentially a half a block wide strip of trees and brushes that ran parallel between the church and the condo where he'd spend his last days in his hometown. With his heart thumping wildly, Michael had tried to weigh the risks of hiding the bike until later or being seen ditching it in broad daylight with a cold detachment, the operative word being "tried." What once was a trophy had become a serious liability. _

_The presence of the police on the other side of the nearby bridge over the Miami River had not been very reassuring regardless of his course of action. Hoping that someone else would steal it and take it off his__ hands, the teenager had concealed the bike in some thick brush near the water, doffing the jacket and helmet as well. Jamming the gloves into his back pocket, he had checked twice to ensure no one had seen him and then replaced his ball cap on his head. Pulling the bill down over his eyes, he'd walked off._

The details of the journey from the park to the condo were fuzzy, but the fear of exposure, the frustration of having no way to transport his things now, the anger at himself for getting caught up in his emotions and the sorrow that he had been so desperately trying to push down were crystal clear in his mind as he sat there sipping his makeshift iced tea and thinking that maybe he was being watched.

Michael didn't really remember either what he had said exactly to the young, brown-eyed, black-haired beauty with the mocha-colored skin behind the concierge desk, but whatever the details were of the story he'd given her, it was sufficient, along with the password, to earn him a trip up to the twelfth floor and the reassurance that Ms. Drummond, the realtor, was not expected to be there anytime soon.

And he recalled with great clarity the moment he had opened the bankers' box he'd brought upstairs with the bags containing his clothes and personal belongings. He'd been puzzled by it and thus preferred to open it in the privacy of the condo. It had contained every memento, piece of jewelry or stuffed animal he had ever bought or stolen for Jennifer. The note within was simple_: If you're coming back to me, bring this with you. If not, you've already taken my heart. Just take these things with you, too. Jen_

Sitting in public in uniform made it easier for the young Army recruit to control himself as the unwelcome memory filtered through his brain. Then Michael focused on the civilians and the soldiers, already drawing an "us" and "them" distinction between the people moving about the airport, and let his mind go blank to everything except analyzing the multitude of directional vectors and subsequent variances at work as the mass of humanity in front of him tried to navigate the teeming space.

He hadn't had the benefit of that same level of distraction available back at the condo. He'd looked up from the paper, but the breathtaking view was completely lost on him as the teenager had gazed blindly out the massive glass window at the river and the bay, crushing the stationary in his trembling fist.

But what Michael did have at _that _particular moment had been a _que linda_ diversion, a young woman who was not at all his type, but who'd been so thoroughly the antithesis of the girl he was trying to forget, who'd been more than eager to help him ease whatever pain was tearing at his heart that he willingly lost himself in the embrace of another false intimacy, spectacular fellatio up against the marble topped vanity leading to an intense coupling on a very expensive, but fortunately dark, bathroom rug.

_That _remembrance proved enough of a disruption to his observations that by the time he'd realized it, the man he'd previously thought was watching him had time to sufficiently advance on his position such that Michael had no choice but to stand and salute the tall, solidly built first lieutenant with the knowing smile instead of the perpetual scowl the recruit had come to associate with all the NCO's on the base.

It suddenly struck him that the officer coming towards him was looking at his cover, which Michael preferred to wear whenever it was permissible, and his quick run-down of all the vast and complex rules the Army had for situations that involved hats and greetings must have shown on his face. He hoped the officer's amusement at his fleeting quandary would continue to translate into a favorable interaction between them. Michael knew he had a great deal of abuse to look forward to when he returned to basic training and too much past history that he was still trying to leave behind right at that instant.

Besides, he was already looking at adding returning late from his first leave to his Army record. Pissing off a decorated Lieutenant in the Ranger Corps was decidedly not on his list of things to do this morning.

"Sir, good morning, Lt. Novak, sir," the young man said whilst executing a sharp salutation and thanking his lucky stars that he'd taken the time to learn where the man's name tag, Ranger patch and rank insignia would be located amongst the brass and ribbons on the forest green jacket.

"At ease, recruit," Novak ordered and then grinned broadly. "Good eye, uh… ?" He peered at where his name was sewn above Michael's shirt pocket. "Westen, is it? Mind if I join you?"

The teenager wasn't sure that he entirely had a choice, but there was something in the demeanor of the superior officer that told him he wouldn't be _immediately_ regretting this encounter "Sir, of course not, sir," he replied quickly, somewhat befuddled by the older man asking _his_ permission to do _anything_.

"Very well then, resume your post, Recruit Westen," the raven haired lieutenant commanded, evidently still in a good humor. "And one 'sir' will do. I'm not your DI."

"Thank you, sir," Michael responded with evident relief, though he continued to wait for the proverbial other shoe to drop as the military man was seemingly carefully taking inventory of one of the US government's latest acquisitions. At the moment, there was no derogatory commentary forthcoming.

"What are you planning on doing for AIT?" he asked conversationally as he set his carry-on down on the other empty chair next to the matching grey metal table.

"I haven't finished Basic yet, sir, Red Phase only before Christmas break, sir."

That drew an almost startled reaction from his superior.

"You from a military family?"

"No, sir," Michael answered as he wondered where this was going.

"Hmmm," Novak seemed to ponder that for a minute. "What are you aiming for?"

Michael held his breath for second, hoping that this was would not be perceived as a suck-up answer.

"I want to be a Ranger, sir."

Before the officer could react, the blushing brunette descended upon her new customer.

Novak ordered a hot breakfast and Michael's stomach had the temerity to rumble in response to merely the thought of a warm morning meal. Cold cereal had been the rule of thumb at his house for as long as he could remember. Platters of properly cooked eggs, bacon, grits and biscuits only materialized when he'd been fortunate enough to be sent to the diner where Ms. Watkins' worked before school.

The fact that he hadn't eaten since yesterday afternoon, aside from the intensely sweet slice of southern hospitality the waitress had bestowed upon him. and he didn't have the money to resolve that problem hadn't helped the situation. The teenager did have the good grace to flush and protest appropriately as the Ranger had told the girl to bring Michael the same meal and put it on his check.

"I remember broke at Basic," Lt. Novak informed him. "I'm not _that_ old."

"No, sir, thank you, sir," the young recruit replied, puzzled by his good fortune and its source. He was leery of doing something wrong. As he had learned from a young age, those in charge frequently had volatile tempers and good moods could come and go as quickly as an afternoon thunder storm in Miami.

After a minute of poking around in his gear, Novak turned his attention back to the younger man before him. He thought carefully where to start as the would-be Ranger across from him seemed overwound.

"So, why do you want to be in Special Forces?"

Michael thought what he'd told his mother when he'd handed her the recruitment papers and about what he'd said to the man with the high and tight haircut and the smart uniform sitting behind a shiny oak desk at the USARO near Doral when he turned those papers in. But mostly he remembered what Miz W had said to him that night his Dad had tried to choke him and her words of encouragement.

"_Sugar, you need to git on outta this place for you git caught up with the wrong people doin' the wrong things like 'dre or worse, like that little Higgins boy. You're better'n that. You gotta good heart and you's always been lookin' out fer them what can't take o' theyselves. My boy's got too much o' his Daddy in him, too prideful to back down and use his damned head. He's gonna end up dead or in jail, but I don' wanna see that happen to you, baby. You's smarter than that. You don' have to end up like 'dre. I know you're worried over your Mama and Nate, but your Mama done made her choices and you can make somethin' o' yourself, child, and be better than you been brought up to, be whatever you wanna be."_

"To be the best of the best and defend my country, sir," Michael hoped that he didn't sound like he was regurgitating a recruiting pamphlet because he really did feel that way. He wanted to so badly to serve a cause higher than being the intermediary punching bag between his father and the rest of his family. If he could put all that misery and pain to some use for the greater good, then it would somehow make everything he'd gone through growing up worth it all. "I've been training for it since I could walk, sir."

The lieutenant caught the wince at what was presumably a slip, sure now that the kid hadn't meant to add that last part, and wondering at the source. He'd already said he wasn't from a military family.

"So your parents encouraged you to pursue the military at a young age?" Novak guessed. There could be a multitude of reasons for the teenager wanting to join up, but this one didn't seem like the typical gung ho hothead trying to prove something or the 'got no place better to go' sad sack he'd seen all too often.

"Not exactly, sir."

_Holy shit, look at you, Slick. Damn, ah never thought ah'd see the day ya'd let anybody cut your damned hair and put you in a fooking uniform. Sonuvabitch, how's it feel to be told when you can wipe your ass?_

"Well, obviously they supported your decision to enlist. You wouldn't have gotten to go on Christmas leave in the middle of basic if you weren't underage, so they had to have signed the papers."

Recruit Westen wondered again briefly what his mother had done to get his father to sign him up and then decided that, based on the past week, it was because his dad couldn't wait to get clear of him. The fact old man had pawned his possessions pretty much said _goodbye and good riddance_ to Michael.

"Something like that, sir," was the best response he could come up with.

Novak mulled that over for a minute. "So, how was leave? Feel strange to be back home so soon?"

"Yes, sir," Michael answered a little too fervently and again cursed himself silently for another verbal gaffe as he caught the superior officer nodding at him with a look of recognition.

Luckily for the hungry young man, their server returned just then with two large plates of a hearty fried breakfast and two steaming mugs of coffee, which was not his cup of tea at all so to speak, but Mr. Westen decided to smile and be grateful for the food as well as the break in the conversation.

The lieutenant hadn't come up with a subtle way to ask about Michael's firearms proficiency, but he was sufficiently awed with the teenager's targeting skills to assume his abilities with actual weapons would be equally extraordinary. Once they'd established that the youth was from Miami, the question of where he'd acquired his training had become a moot point; it certainly wasn't _formal_ instruction. But however the recruit had managed it, he wouldn't have gotten into the Army with a criminal record intact and he seemed to Novak to be not only resourceful, but genuinely sincere in his desire to excel and be of service. Training at Fort Benning was a good start to what could turn out to be a stellar career.

Michael thanked his benefactor almost a little too profusely for the meal and for the officer's time as he had quickly turned the topic of discussion to the Rangers and what he needed to do to ensure his entrance into the elite corps once they had eaten the majority of their breakfast. Novak complimented recruit's choice of observation post and the concentration level he'd exhibited during the brief time the older man had been able to watch him. Michael was advised that his superior would be monitoring his progress and intended to see to it, provided his performance throughout basic and AIT was exemplary, that the private would be considered for both sharp shooter school and entrance into the Rangers.

"I'll do my part," Lt. Novak assured him. "The rest is up to you. You know what you have to do, son."

It was then Mr. Westen had spotted his relatives at the far end of the terminal and a quick check of his watch let Michael know that he would indeed make it back to Fort Benning in time. Breathing a sigh of relief and smiling, he told the lieutenant why he'd been concerned and again the Ranger was suitably impressed with the younger man's ability to pick out a target down range amongst a substantial crowd.

"I've got my eye on you, Westen," the dark haired man said with a wide grin as they saluted one another and parted company. Michael was so elated by his sudden turn of good fortune that he couldn't have cared less about the wait that Levi was tersely apologizing for. That blown water pump had been a bitch for his relatives to deal with, but it had provided him with an unparalleled opportunity and he couldn't believe his fortuity. Plus, the ride back to Fort Benning would give him the time to assess his progress towards his objective as well as process or more accurately compartmentalize the collateral damage.

()()

Michael had listened to his relatives' tales of what, how and why they had been delayed in picking him up with expertly feigned interest. He knew now that if he smiled and nodded enough, eventually Shane would fall asleep in the front seat and Levi would tire of the one sided discourse and he would be free.

Part of him was still glowing from the praise and promises that he had received from Lt. Novak. That a decorated war veteran was taking a positive interest in him and planned on rewarding his hard work had the young recruit more determined than ever to succeed. Of course, it remained to be seen if he could take the man at his word, but Michael refused to let doubt cloud his resolve. The officer had been impressed with the skills he'd picked up just by surviving South Florida. With the proper training, he was convinced that as an Army Ranger sharp shooter, he would be one unstoppable sonuvabitch.

So as he sat in the back of old but once again drivable '65 Chevy Impala Wagon not watching the old man negotiate the twists and turn that took them onto I-85 south from the airport, it was his uncle's remark to his cousin about the lack of opportunity for female companionship and the various shades of blue that Shane's nether regions would turn before he got another leave to do anything about it except 'run it off by hand' that had Michael remembering that he'd had a very good week in that department despite, or more likely due to, the loss of his high school sweetheart and he found himself tuning out the chatter between the Georgia branch of the family in the forward part of the vehicle and reminiscing.

He hadn't _meant_ to hurt Jennifer, but he had, and the truth that they were destined to separate in no way ameliorated his feelings about the sorry manner in which he had executed the break-up. The emotional anguish that he'd bottled up over the guilt and the loss meant that Michael hadn't wasted any time using his sexual prowess to ease the pain, as well as gain social currency and better sleeping arrangements with certain women during his leave. While he'd had to spend _some_ time with his family, the eldest boy had had no intention of _ever_ sleeping under Frank Westen's roof again, especially not in that shell of the room which was now devoid of his personal belongings thanks to his father. There was no way Michael was going to give his dad the opportunity to either ambush him or rip him off again.

Unfortunately for Madeline, Mr. Westen had been in agreement with his son that Michael was capable of making his own arrangements, despite her protests to the contrary. The fact that his sire was siding with him against his mom was not completely unheard of in his lifetime. But it was unusual, as was his dad's over all good humor, though that could be directly traced to the arrival of Lady Luck at his poker table on a semi-regular basis. The eldest boy could hardly complain. It had gotten him a plane ticket.

Of course, Nate claiming it'd been his presence in the room as the official underage bartender had in no way thrilled their mother, but Michael had seen she wasn't going to get much traction with her arguments against taking an eleven year old to a smoke filled room, full of alcohol, guns and middle aged, middle management level wise guys and various other riff raff, since it was Christmas break and there was no "school night" to help enforce a curfew; not that Frank Westen much respected any sort of limitation if it got in his way of him doing what he wanted to do when he wanted to do it.

Watching Nate's eyes light up as he described the scene to his big brother at dinner the first night he had come by the house, albeit not his first night in town, had both pleased and disturbed Michael. He'd been thrilled his little brother had found a way to relate to their father that didn't involve taking a beating or someone else taking it for him. But it had troubled him greatly that Nathaniel Elias Westen now had an encyclopedic knowledge of mixology and the variations of innumerable card games. It had also proven his point that Nate was bright but apathetic if the subject didn't interest him and no amount of his dad's "motivational techniques" had ever done much to improve the youngest boy's GPA.

He had shrugged internally at Madeline's attempts of varying degrees of subtly to convince her husband that he should bond with Nate over something less illegal. What she hadn't known was that the older son's bonding time with his father over automobiles had also been in chop shops, junk yards and parking lots, learning the most efficient way to boost and strip cars as well as fix them. But Michael had poured another huge serving of starchy gravy over his thoroughly cooked meatloaf and reminded himself what went on there wasn't his concern any longer, deciding where he was going to sleep that night was.

He had already spent his first two nights back in Miami prior to the family dinner with Kimberly Hardeman, the high profile criminal attorney who had previously had his juvenile records sealed and had convinced both the Army and the Dade County School District to accept Michael's GED certificate as a valid high school diploma. Then, after the three most brutal weeks of Basic Training and Recruit Westen was convinced that he could succeed in his quest, suddenly just sealed wasn't good enough for him. He wanted his records expunged. If gangsters and drug lords could get their pasts wiped clean, there was no reason why he shouldn't have that privilege. She'd promised him one last freebie if he ever got back in town. Once he'd been provided with a plane ticket to Miami, he'd made a point of contacting her and arranging to meet her after work at her condo at the Brickell on the River complex as soon as he'd arrived.

As I-85 rose and fell over the foothills of the central Georgia landscape, a mixture of hibernating grass, leafless deciduous branches hanging from bare trunks and evergreen conifers, Michael found himself remembering in detail what she'd said to him once he'd finally walked over from Ms. Drummond's condo to hers, fresh from a long shower and wearing decent clothes for the first time in seven weeks.

"_There you are, just in time for _cocktail_ hour," she'd commented as the petite brunette had opened the door. She was already out of her Giorgio Armani work wear and into a short silk robe with an Asian calligraphy print. "How long have you been in town, Pro Bono?"_

"_Pro Bono?" he'd echoed as he'd ducked in the doorway, not removing the white Panama hat that he'd borrowed from the concierge at the other condo. It was exactly like the one he'd lost to the Second Chance consignment store thanks to Frank Westen. _

"_You know, that thing they make lawyers do so many times a year to remind them that they are supposed to have souls?"_

"_I know what it means," he'd replied to the buff, spray tanned woman who had turned around to face him as soon as she'd thrown the dead bolts into place. _

"_I suppose I could just call you JL then," she'd shrugged and then smiled as his off duty attorney had walked him backwards towards the breakfast bar, which was covered with snacks, various alcohols and mixers. "You were a serious judgment lapse on my part after all." _

"_Are we expecting company?" Michael had wondered aloud, looking over the spread on the marble countertop behind him._

_Ms. Hardeman had kicked off her three inch high pumps and had immediately found herself eye to chin with him. "No one," she'd purred. "My calendar is cleared for the next two days and you made it right on time." Her smile had become seductive before she'd leaned in and captured his mouth in a hard kiss. _

"_I assumed I wouldn't be seeing you again once you'd moved out of Michelle's condo," Kimberly had told the breathless young man as she'd released him. "So we have a reason to celebrate, just you and me."_

_Michael had flinched and she'd laughed knowingly. He hated being reminded that Jennifer's mother was on a first name basis with his legal counsel and she liked to make sure he knew who was in charge._

"_You didn't need to dress up." She had pulled loose the pins and let her shoulder length, highlighted hair fall free around her shoulders in waves. "I think we both understand the terms of engagement by now."_

_He'd been puzzled by her remark and it had showed as she ran her hands over the loose white linen jacket and neon blue muscle shirt underneath it, her manicured, blood red nails scrapping over the planes of his chest and causing him to draw a deep breath, deeper than he'd intended. Kim's hands had drifted lower, skimming the matching white fabric on his hips and settling on his leather belted waist._

"_I assumed you were trying to remind me why I was doing pro bono work for you again."_

_Michael hadn't realized that until the moment she'd mentioned it. It had been his best clubbing outfit, the one that made him look older and was fashion forward enough to interest the power suit crowd. Maybe he _had _subconsciously donned the clothing he'd worn that night he'd gone out with the intention of making sure that he went home with Ms. Kimberly Hardeman, Esquire, from that nightclub in South Beach where the beautiful people played after hours. It had been his cover for deceiving a normally eagle-eyed attorney into missing the fact that she was taking an under-aged male home after copious amounts of booze, cocaine and dirty dancing. Maybe he'd meant to remind _himself_ what it had meant._

_She'd skimmed off his hat and stifled a gasp at his missing hair, running her hands repeatedly over his nearly naked scalp as the white Panama hat had fallen onto the ivory carpet. "Oh… my….God….."_

"_Yea," Michael had replied. "It takes a lot of getting used to. Disappointed?"_

_Suddenly her smile had returned, flashing wider than before, and her eyes had sparked with raw lust._

"_Come on," she'd urged. "I think it's only right that you get to do your fair share of shaving things." _

_She'd slipped out of her robe then, letting it float down to the floor and cover his hat. _

"_I'm in need of some _delicate _maintenance and I think you're _just _the man for the job." _

_Doffing his loafers and dropping his jacket onto one of the tall chairs nearby, he'd found himself being pulled towards the bathroom with murmured promises of all the erotic things that awaited him there…_

"Hey, boy, are ya running a fever? Ya look powerful flushed back thar. Ya sure ya ain't takin' sick?"

Michael looked up to find his uncle eying him suspiciously in the rear view mirror. He coughed and blushed even brighter at having been caught in a series of memories that would be the source of masturbation fantasies for months to come, which only reinforced the impression that he was sick.

"I'm just not used to the cold," he mumbled, breaking eye contact and throwing a glance at the still form of Levi's son in the front passenger seat. Shane was doing a terrific imitation of a chain saw in his sleep, the young man's head thrown back and his mouth hanging open. So, his cousin lowered his head, leaning against the window, and closed his eyes with an exaggerated yawn for some privacy of his own.

Kim Hardeman's legal acumen and viciousness in court was well matched with her sexual appetites and voraciousness in the bedroom. By dawn of the third day, she had gone off to work and then he had slept most of the morning away. The teenager had awoken naked and alone on satin sheets that needed a serious wash. But he'd been confident that his criminal past was disappearing while he was showering off and getting dressed for the first time in three days. He'd known he'd needed to clear out of her place and see his family, which he had surprisingly been okay with. He'd actually been looking forward to _sleeping_ on Miz W's couch, although just the _thought_ of Madeline's cooking had given him heartburn.

Michael's mind then returned to that surreal dinner on the first night back with his entire family. He had in no way been surprised that his mother hadn't mentioned his arrival and subsequent disappearance on his first day back. She had privately mentioned to her eldest so, as she had all but demanded that he help her take out of the trash, that Patrick Carney had been by looking for him. That remembrance raised a momentary smirk, which he quickly concealed lest Levi question him again.

Michael then found himself thinking about the girl he hadn't intended on spending time with. His inability to speak Spanish, and doubtless some of his father's prejudices had rubbed off along the way, meant that while Michael had spent time in Calle Ocho and Little Havana, it had been on the streets and not between the sheets. While he had finally gotten into Ms. Drummond's condo thanks to her, getting out of the clutches of Carmen the concierge and into the shower had taken no small amount of doing.

Fortunately for him, she'd had to clean up and go back downstairs before her absence from the front desk got her fired. When he'd kissed her goodbye before venturing out on his walk up US 1 north towards his primary mission objective for this trip, he'd promised to come back and see her in a few days and she'd promised to keep his stuff safe for him until his return. She'd grinned broadly as she'd handed him that wide brimmed, Panama hat to guard his shiny scalp from the Miami sun.

And Carmen had been as good as her word and better. After spending the afternoon until her shift was over hanging around Brickell Park and trying to figure what to do with the motorcycle which was regrettably still concealed in the brush after three days, Michael had finally mapped out a route which would allow him to gear up the bike, to send it streaking towards the water at a point where it would soar far and sink fast, and provide him with adequate cover when the impending dusk would cloak him the rest of the way. His belongings had already been stowed in her car and, with the deed done, they had sped away, laughing like idiots at his brazenness and her willingness to be his accomplice.

She'd dropped him and his things at Miz W's house with the expectation that she would pick him up there _tomorrow_ after another family dinner with the Westen clan. He'd been truly exhausted and not interested in letting his guard down in a strange bed, to sleep or otherwise. Carmen had pouted, but he knew how to get his way with women. One winning smile and tongue laden kiss later, she'd agreed.

And Fortune had smiled on him as well. Marvella Watkins had been home when he'd arrived and her sons had not. That had allowed him to stow his things somewhere that they would not come to the attention or possession of his former childhood best friend. It had pained Michael to have to think that way about Andre, but if his own mother had felt compelled to have hidden compartments under lock and key in her own home, then who was he to say anything?

The man in question had startled him awake late the next afternoon while he'd been napping on Miz W's couch, trying to rest up for another round of family drama and living la vida loca afterwards, as Andre had sauntered in with his posse in tow. Ridiculously outnumbered, Michael had opted to keep his opinions about the gang to himself at the moment. With Ricky in the house and Miz W gone to work, he'd managed to maneuver the drinking and smoking assembly that now included a group of their mutual neighborhood friends as well as Andre's peeps to the backyard. But he'd soon found himself nursing a beer and toking as the joint passed by to keep up appearances with the Northwest regulars.

While being universally razzed about his lack of hair, "Mad Dog" had tried to inhale and imbibe as little as possible. Nevertheless, his senses suddenly had been simultaneously swamped with paradoxical feelings of pleasant numbness and hypersensitivity. Struggling to keep control as the reminiscing about old times gave way to exaggerating about street racing back in the day, which Michael had no need to embellish his exploits from a couple of months ago, he'd suddenly found himself holding the car keys to a brand new black Mercedes Benz 190E when he'd asked for a ride over to his former residence.

If he'd been in his right mind, it would have dawned on the teenager that the vehicle was hotter than asphalt in August. But even if he hadn't figured _that_ out, the barely suppressed sniggers as he'd walked away should have been his first clue. As it was, he'd put Miz W's house in his rear view in record time.

As he had barreled down NW 9th Court towards its intersection with NW North River Drive, the road had seemed to get longer and longer. It had suddenly occurred to him that the street was not _that long_ and the house was approaching sooner rather than later. At his present speed and trajectory, he would've launched the auto into the river on the other side of said North River Drive if he didn't stop _right then_.

So he had stamped the brakes with both feet and thrown the steering wheel over hard left, causing the high performance luxury car to spin out, finally coming to a rest in a cloud of smoke. While it still had t_echnically_ been on the street, it'd narrowly missed connecting with the back of his father's Charger.

As Frank had been standing at the garage entrance, supervising Nate in the rebuild of his mother's car motor, Mr. Westen had arrived at the curb side in an instant, screaming invectives at the _gawd damned fookin' assholes_ who had almost rear ended his car. When Michael had emerged, swaying and sort of staggering from the driver's door towards the pair, he'd grinned broadly at his sire's stunned silence.

Of course, like anything else within the Westen household, the quiet interlude had been only temporary.

"_Sonuvabitch, Slick, ya always did have more balls than brains… whud the hell d'ya think ya're doin'?" His dad's practiced eye immediately had discerned what his older son had failed to in his adulterated state. _

"_Wow, Mike, can you do that again?" Nate had asked excitedly as he raced to his big brother's side, swimming in one of his old worn T-shirts and covered in grease from almost head to toe. _

"_Not if he knows whud's good fer him. Git back ta work," Frank had barked the order, shooing the younger boy away by raising the back of his hand, who'd wisely but reluctantly chosen to scurry away._

"_What's wrong with mom's car?" Michael had slurred. It had driven him nuts the other day trying to figure what his father had been up to and it had seemed as good a time as any to find out._

"_Nutthin'. Just teaching the little shit ta rebuild an engine since your ma kept bitchin' 'bout it knockin' but it's jus' the fookin' push rods chatterin' anyway." His dad looked him up one side and down the other, sniffing and not smelling what he expected. _

_That was the moment Madeline chose to emerge from the back door with a bag of garbage in her hand._

"_Michael," she'd been both rejoicing and wary, taking in the scene before her as she walked down from the house to the end of the drive and the dented trash cans thereby. "You're early for dinner."_

"_Who the hell was that on the phone, Maddie?"_

_As she looked from her husband to her oldest child, his mom's moment of indecision had betrayed her._

"_Madeline…" her spouse had growled a warning with one eye on her and one on his son. This time however Michael had made no move to assume a fighting stance. He'd stayed where he was, leaning against the car with his arms folded over his navy blue polo shirt and his denim-clad legs crossed. _

"_It was Mrs. Carney again," the blonde had admittedly reluctantly._

"_Carney?" they'd echoed together._

"_Is that the little punk ass mother fooker that came over here looking for Mike earlier, something about stealin' from him and then beatin' up his girlfriend?" Frank had asked his wife, but looked at his offspring._

"_That lying prick," his son had actually snorted, strangely finding it funny that Patrick would try to claim the purplish mess of Jennifer's make-up had been actual bruises. "She was never _his_ girlfriend, anyway."_

"_Where'd the car come from, asshole?" his dad had demanded, not liking what he'd thought was going on or where this whole scenario seemed to be headed. _

"_It's not his," Michael had cut him off, his inexplicable good humor making the normally taciturn youth suddenly loose in the lips. "I didn't steal his car. I stole the bike he got for his birthday and then ditched it in the Miami River cuz the jackass was telling everyone he was banging Jennifer behind my back."_

"_You stole his motorcycle because he stole your girlfriend?" his mother had gasped. _

_Abruptly, the senior Mister Westen had cut loose with an uproarious belly laugh._

"_Damn, Slick," he said, as the older man continued to chuckle, "Ah didn't think ya had it in ya, sonuvabitch."_

"_Frank," she'd started to admonish._

"_Git your ass on in there and finish dinner, woman! This ain't none of your business." _

_Nate, who had edged his way down the driveway, went flying back to hide behind the front end of the Skylark as his mother had gone past. He'd peered warily at the duo standing near the street._

_Frank had still been shaking his head and grinning when abruptly the smile had turned hard and he'd grabbed his oldest son by the throat and then slamming him up against the newer black vehicle. _

"_Git that fookin' thing outta muh driveway and git rid of it now! Ya ever come over to muh house with a hot car agin an' ah'll knock ya into the middle o' next week, ya dumb fook." His father had released him and taken a step back. "Hurry up about it, too. Your ma'll never stop whining if ya're late fer supper."_

Later, when he'd figured out how messed up he was, it had made sense why he had just shrugged and had calmly driven away to Triple H's chop shop with the purloined vehicle and then came back to eat.

()()

As Interstate 85 gave way to Interstate 185, the movement from the exit ramps to the entrance ramps had taken Michael from his reverie and the teenager realized that he had actually drifted off to sleep at some point. Waking up in a strange place was something young Mr. Westen was used to. In fact, the older he got, the less often he was sure of where he was going to wake up. As he stretched and yawned, he decided it was just another aspect of his upbringing that he would find useful as an Army Ranger.

Finding himself sprawled out on the worn back seat of the old Chevy with only his arm for a pillow was not uncomfortable. He was an expert at sleeping in a car and the cold reminded him that winter, such that it was in South Florida, was the far better time for said activity. He decided his imperviousness to heat and humidity would serve him well in the variety of hot spots around the world to which he was likely to be assigned. One normally put on more gear in the military rather than less and there was a generally a limit to what the Army would allow you take off at any given time.

That thought led him back to how little he had worn on the whole while he'd been in Miami on leave in December. He'd spent three days in Kim Hardeman's condo never dressing once at her insistence, not until it was time to leave. He yawned again and realized that was the longest he had ever gone without clothing in his entire life. Michael Westen did not do undressed for any longer than it took to bath.

As he considered that fact, lying there bundled in his uniform, boots and field jacket, he was reminded that there'd been plenty of times he'd had sex without getting completely unclothed. He'd been tangled up in his garments every time he'd been with Carmen. When he'd woken up in her apartment with a massive headache the morning after he'd made Triple H's day with that appropriated auto, he'd certainly been exposed but not totally undressed.

It had probably been a good thing he'd spent the night with his new latina friend, because once he'd come to his senses and started to piece together what had happened, he'd been hotter than that stolen piece of high quality German engineering. He'd taken the car that he'd gotten off of Mr. Higgins to use while he was still on leave and burned rubber back over to Miz W's to start his search for Andre. His discussion with Andre's little brother, whom he'd found home with his mother for a change, had only added fuel to that fire. Ricky had taken him to the side to let him know that he'd overheard some of Andre's guys talking about lacing the lid with angel dust and making sure that Michael had taken the most hits on that chip.

He'd just finished his conversation with young Mr. Watkins when the older one pulled up, alone this time in a hooptie that might have been taken, but certainly was not for resale. Michael hadn't wasted any time laying out for his former childhood best friend what his issues were with him in no uncertain terms.

"_Get outta muh face, Mad Dog," Andre had warned. "Don' be dissin' me in fronta Ricky. I don' give a shit if yo' my mamma's boy, ya don' get ta come here an' start somethin' wif' me in muh own crib, bitch. Ya wanna start somethin' wif me, ya bald headed mutha fucka? I'll snatch the hair right back on yo head!" _

In the end, Michael wasn't sure what had made him madder, the fact that Andre completely disregarded the health and safety of _his_ mother and little brother by bringing trouble into their home in the form of various gang members and low life's while he had taken beating after beating to defend Madeline and Nate from the trouble already inside their household, that Andre had broken his promise to get out of that life style or that Andre had called him out for running off to the military instead of standing his ground and letting some skinny, rich honkie take his woman. He wasn't even sure who had thrown the first punch, but it didn't matter. The final result was they were beating the crap out of one another.

He had been so wrapped up in the fight that he hadn't even heard Miz W ordering them to break it up at the top of her lungs, though she'd assured him later that she'd given them both plenty of warning before she'd turned the hose on them full blast. As the ice cold water had poured over the combatants, they had broken apart and started yelling at her instead of whaling on each other. While she'd been dressing them down for fighting in the street like a couple of stray dogs, Patrick Carney had made the mistake of pulling alongside the curb of the Watkins's residence with a group of his friends in tow.

What happened next had been a lesson that the future spy had taken away with him and extrapolated into shifting geopolitical alliances and learning to ally with one's momentary opponents to fight a greater enemy.

Michael sat up and stretched again, a big smile on his face at that particular memory. The privileged jocks might have been athletic, but they had quickly learned that the most important thing in a fight was being able to take a hit rather than deliver one and that people who'd taken beatings often knew how to hand out one with brutal efficiency. The two defensemen had learned there was a vast difference between a high school gridiron confrontation and a street fight within seconds, which had made the remainder of Mr. Carney's compadres more interested in beating a retreat than getting beaten, too.

"Whatcha smiling about, boy?" Levi queried, looking at his distantly related nephew in the rear view again. "You seem powerful happy t'be goin' back t'base."

"Yeah," he agreed and then considered the older man's conclusion once again, remembering Ms. Watkins' words to him as the woman who'd been a surrogate mother to him had dressed his wounds, following his long, hot shower and change of clothes.

"_Just remember this, sweet thing, it says in the Good Book that if you intend to do a thing, you sits down and ya counts the cost and you makes sure you gotta enough in ya to finish what you start, cuz what'll happen to you if you don't? I know you have it in ya to finish this, baby. Nobody's gonna mock ya fer not finishin' cuz that's not you, Michael. When you put your mind t'something, you don' stop. Like that king what made sure he had what he needed to go to war. You got it in you to be somebody and I'm gonna hold you to it, sugar, cuz I knows what it's cost ya and you knows what you have to do to get there. I'm proud of you, baby. I'm sorry 'bout 'dre, but he don' want it, so that's over…I'll do what I can, but I have to look for Ricky now, cuz you, Michael, you and Ricky… Y'all gonna be somebody some day, I knows it." _

"Yes," Recruit Westen said louder, realizing that he was indeed happy to be going back to base and away from the madness of his upbringing and towards something positive, however painful and difficult it might be to achieve. But he had counted the cost and found himself eager, regardless of the abuse, the bad food and the bullshit that awaited him. He was ready to move forward towards his goal and make something of himself, to be all that he could be and let his suffering serve a higher purpose. "Yes, I am."

_He was going to be a Ranger and _nothing _was going to get in the way of that._

**()()**

A/N**: **_For anyone interested, the scripture Miz W quoted is Luke 14:28-33_

**_Coming a week from Monday, a dark new multi-chapter story co-authored with Purdy's Pal, under the pen name Jedi's Pal. Check us out tomorrow night under our joint profile._**


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